13 thoughts on “Karen McCarron guilty on all counts!”

ryc: I brought it up on my blog because yesterday I logged in and learned that a member unexpectedly passed away, a few weeks past another member passing on unexectedly which was days after mightymama went on. Today learned that a week ago an mama who was a member was killed, and that especially hit me because it was the husband that did it. :*(

I’d only been in tao to browse for brain candy over coffee and I’ve had to ponder mortality instead. life is odd like that.

I say good. For too long the murders of disabled children have gotten off with not even a handslap, but with murmurs of sympathy. And to state that she SHOULD have been found insane merely because typical people cannot understand how one could take a life in cold blood, dismisses the fact that evil does exist in the world.

I don’t know that I should say she’s evil. I should say that she is the antithesis of God, lacking in grace and compassion and trust in God’s will.

I guess in thinking about this particular case, I’m wary of what I perceive to be a mob burn at the stake mentality. Like most mortals I hate nothing more than to hear that a parent has killed their child or children. Based on what I’ve read, she had to have been insane or at least in a temporary psychosis just to do what she did. Perhaps it’s me and I cannot fathom someone doing such a thing being completely of sound mind, and I’ve dealt with depression just from having kids, no I didn’t feel like killing anyone, but I lived in irrational fear that somehow we’d all be killed and the thoughts were obsessive and disruptive. I don’t know how I would feel about a not guilty by reason of insanity, though either. I guess I’ll be watching for the sentencing. I’d really hope for a guarded institution.

Are people not talking about what it can do to some adults emotionally and mentally to be raising a special needs/handicapped/as child? I see a lot of tall and proud folks about who seem to be saying “I can handle it, you can’t so you must be evil/whatever”. or “Autism is not a tragedy so stop whining and suck it up”. (not a real quote, just my impression of it) That’s fine but everyone is different, yk? I noted her age and that this seems to be her only child. Was it her only preg? An assumption I’m making that conceiving at 35/36 and that b/c she was a professional, this was a wanted baby. Who is anyone else to tell her what she should have concluded after learning her wanted baby wasn’t quite how she pictured? Most of us folk can soldier on… People do go through a grieving-like cycle after a dx. Lord knows I stomped my feet and tantrumed and said it’s not fair when I realized K has aspergers’ and that meant for forever.

She was not Katie’s sole caregiver. Actually for most of Katie’s life post-diagnosis, she wasn’t her caregiver at all! Katie lived in another state with her paternal grandparents so she could attend an autism school and had only been reunited with her mother shortly before her murder, and her mother was still not her primary caregiver, as the grandparents and Katie’s father were still very much more involved wiht her care than Karen. Also, Katie had a younger sister who Karen apparently thought much better of.

This is not a case of a poor, burnt-out mother whose cries for help in tending for her disabled child fell on the deaf ears of an uncaring world. Not by a long, long shot.

One thing sticks out to me in your comment though, more than anything else:

Who is anyone else to tell her what she should have concluded after learning her wanted baby wasn’t quite how she pictured?

Nobody can tell her how she should have felt. But we can absolutely tell her how she should have behaved – and that was NOT to have murdered her daughter, but instead to have said “You take her. I think she’s broken. I don’t want her anymore.”

“Are people not talking about what it can do to some adults emotionally and mentally to be raising a special needs/handicapped/as child? I see a lot of tall and proud folks about who seem to be saying “I can handle it, you can’t so you must be evil/whatever”. or “Autism is not a tragedy so stop whining and suck it up”. ”

Raising a special needs child is hard, really hard sometimes. There’s really not two ways about it. But it is also incredibly rewarding and something I am grateful for in my life. I don’t think it’s a matter of parents standing up and saying they are better than anybody else. Some days are definitely better than others. Even though I am intensely grateful for my son, the special challenges he brings into my life still make me crazy occasionally. That goes with the territory. Autism is NOT a tragedy. It isn’t. It’s not easy, but it’s not a death sentence either. I think that when a parent is having a hard day, they need to step back and really look at their child and realize their inherent worth. These kids are amazing, and we need to treat them as such.

i dont feel meanness towards her when i am glad she was found guilty. i feel relief for the rest of society, who she can not kill now. people who kill break a fundamental ‘law’ in my book. there are very few ‘excuses’ beyond self-defense.

i do not know if we will all be brought into account for lifetime prison sentences and death-sentencing in the end. we can only protect the majority from the sick, sick, evil minority the best we can.

it is a difficult topic, the crazy excuse. what if i found my *extremely challenging* children too much and offed them? no one would care because they dont have a diagnosis? what if they were ADD/ADHD, or bipolar as is the popular diagnosis? motherhood is hard, and i think a really hard part of it is meeting the challenge of it. i would like to think that if i knew it was too much for me, i would walk away before i killed anyone. i would also like to think that if i didnt walk away, i would spend the rest of my purposefully wasted life in prison or die at the hands of the state.

this is coming from a pregnant, emotional liberal who happens to support the death penalty and wishes it covered more crimes.

I appreciate everyone’s thoughts 🙂 I did not know (I thought I read enough but I guess I didn’t! but I did figure I’d miss several pertinent details) that she wasn’t an only child and the mom had help to the point of not being the primary caretaker anymore. 🙁 /sad for poor little girl.

This case in which I am familiar with has less to do with autism and much more to do with a person taking multiple anti-depressants and deciding on her own to stop taking her medication, and without the care of a doctor. Wake up people…..shooting last week at Northwestern depressed individual stopped taking anti-depressants. There have been so many incidents of this that I am beginning to wonder if anyone is smart enough to put 2 and 2 together. Google “SSRI Suicide” or “SSRI Homicide” if you want to see want these drugs are causing people to do.

And I will continue to mourn the death of Katie Mccarron and the pain this terrible act has caused so many people!
Dave

I was one of the jurors on this trial. All of the evidence turned over in this case supported every part of the verdicts that were handed out. I am sorry for some of you who don’t understand this process, but the court orders the jury to not have compassion or feelings in the jury deliberation. As much as I feel sorry for the death of a innocent child, no one deserves to be put in prison if they are mentally ill. These verdicts were all based on evidence of the trial.